Legends in Hot Rodding: Harry Bradley – Designer of All Things Automotive
All automobiles, whether it be a hot rod, a custom, a production car, or a Bonneville streamliner, begin with a design. It could be scribbles on a napkin, a drawing on an artist’s sketchpad, or an intricate blueprint created on a CAD computer program. Before metal is cut or a wrench is turned, it starts with a vision. And one of our hobby’s most influential and, yes, visionary designers was the late Harry Bradley.
Harry penned everything from Hot Wheels to award-winning customs. Moreover, he taught at ArtCenter College of Design in Los Angeles, schooling future car designers, including Larry Erickson, of CadZZilla fame.
Bradley was born in Boston, Massachusetts in 1939. To his parents, it seemed he exited the womb clutching a box of Prismacolor pencils. As a youngster he began honing his talent early by taking youth classes at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts. Then tragedy struck – the 14-year-old contracted Polio, paralyzing him from the waist down.
He endured seven months of treatment at Boston Children’s Hospital, and since he still had function of his arms and hands, he continued to draw. The staff encouraged this pursuit by rolling his wheelchair to the window. He sketched cars as they passed.
And he created his first “custom” in the hospital. According to the website Kustomrama, he adorned his wheelchair with mirrors, reflectors, squeeze-bulb horns, handgrips with red, white, and blue vinyl streamers – and a foxtail!
Soon, the soft, bulbous fenders of early-’50s Chevrolet sedans caught his imagination, particularly after he borrowed a jet-black model from a friend. Sketches and designs followed. In 1954, he convinced his parents to sell him their ’51 Bel Air. It was a painted a deep red and was used previously to deliver milk. And despite his promise to leave the car “as is,” as is had a different meaning to a high school kid.
Harry immediately dechromed the hood and moved the gas filler neck into the trunk. For him, it was all about flow and simplification. No extraneous extras. He channeled the body to dial in the stance. The top lost three inches, which required a custom window treatment. The A pillars were tweaked, the hood pancaked, and on and on. Eventually, he dubbed it the La Jolla.
University followed, four years at College of Wooster. After approaching General Motors for a design position, the company suggested further instruction at the famed Pratt Institute. He was so convinced of his talent that he began submitting drawings to magazines like Rodding and Re-styling, Customs Illustrated, and Rod & Custom, a practice he would continue throughout his life.
In 1962, GM recruited Harry Bradley out of Pratt, and he moved to the Motor City. While working for GM, he also became close with the custom car duo of Mike and Larry Alexander – who happened to do projects for Ford! To side-step this inconvenient conflict of interest, he designed under the nom de plume of Designer X.
In 1966, Bradley downsized. Literally. He was recruited by Mattel for the new Hot Wheels toy line. To secure the position, he drove his ’64 El Camino from Michigan to California, with Mattel paying the gas bill. Bradly designed the original 16 Hot Wheels offerings, all sporing metallic paint and chopped tops.
After leaving, Mattel in 1969, he opened his own design consultancy, focusing on all manner of vehicles, plus contributing design concepts for multiple automotive publications. He also became a lecturer at ArtCenter College of Design.
As for vehicles designed specifically by Bradley, he was responsible for much of the 1968 Chevrolet El Camino; his personal ’64 model became a wild custom, later displayed at the Petersen Museum. He also penned the over-the-top Dodge Deora, a radical concept based on the Dodge A100 pickup. It earned the Ridler Award at the 1967 Detroit Autorama.
The number of mind-blowing customs that emerged from Bradley’s fertile mind is too many to count. But his influence on future custom and hot rod designers is undeniable. Take the aforementioned Larry Erickson, who created CadZZilla for ZZ Top, and the Boyd Coddington Alumacoupe. His CV also includes stops as a design director at Ford, General Motors, and Rivian.
Erickson studied under Bradley at ArtCenter. “Harry always worked in the custom vein,” Erickson explained. “He could create a dramatic look through simplification, not complexity. While some hot rod creative drawings are in more a ‘cartoon’ style, Harry’s drawings had a more professional look. He was the first professional production car designers who penned hot rods. He was Chip Foose before there was a Chip Foose.”
There was one teaching technique of Bradley’s that Erickson just had to share. “He would face the classroom,” he said with a chuckle. “And grab a piece of chalk. Then, while facing the students, with his palms facing forward, he would draw a car on the blackboard without looking. I think it was his way of gaining credibility.”
It would be a rare moment anyone would question his bona fides. Harry Bradley inspired and taught a generation of hot rod luminaries – Foose, Thom Taylor, Erickson, and more. Indeed, he’s a worthy addition to our roster of Hot Rod Legends.